


walked into the room you know you made my eyes burn

by firstaudrina



Category: Actor RPF, Classic Hollywood Movies
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-09
Updated: 2015-12-09
Packaged: 2018-05-05 21:10:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5390564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstaudrina/pseuds/firstaudrina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p> Paul's got a cigarette behind his ear and the bluest eyes Jim's ever seen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	walked into the room you know you made my eyes burn

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [don't try to be on time](https://archiveofourown.org/works/293969) by [vlieger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/vlieger/pseuds/vlieger). 



> Set around 1954, during the filming of _East of Eden_ (for Dean) and _The Silver Chalice_ (for Newman). Makes a few references to the [very cute screen-test](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1sLlcarbu4) they did together for _Eden_ , in which Dean was auditioning for Cal and Newman for Aron. Written for [this prompt](http://portions-forfox.livejournal.com/47765.html?thread=630933#t689813).
> 
> An older fic that I figured I'd move over onto AO3.

Paul's got a cigarette behind his ear and the bluest eyes Jim's ever seen. Jim reaches up and plucks the cigarette with nervous bold fingers. "Thank you, if I do say so," he says, sticking it between his lips.

Paul smiles, a slow kind of smile that warms James enough to make him flush. Paul is too clear with James' glasses on, clear down to that knowing playful look in those blue, blue eyes. "You want a light, or you just gonna pose with it?" Paul asks.

Paul's got a handsome All-American face, a football hero face, the kind of guy you'd trust with the keys to your life. Boys like Paul make Jim feel all of twelve years old again, glasses and misery, awkward and bookish. Paul is at all the same auditions as him and it's funny, because they're nothing alike. Paul is a stamped Roman coin and Jim is...Jim.

But if Jim's learned anything it's to be shy and brash by turns, so he reaches over and fishes Paul's lighter out of his front pocket. "I can manage," he says.

"I'll bet," Paul says, smile stretching.

Jim lights up and then pockets the lighter, startling a laugh out of Paul. Jim raises an eyebrow, half a challenge, _come after it if you want it back_. But Paul tucks his hands in his pockets instead, leans back on his heels.

"You been out here long?" Paul asks. "You like it?"

"Lived here as a kid," Jim says. "I like it fine." California is the calm before the storm, his mother's soft hand on his forehead and her soothing voice reciting poetry James didn't begin to understand until just recently. "You?"

"I think I'm East Coast at heart," Paul says. He smiles, a quick flash, and steals the cigarette back, fingers brushing Jim's chin. Paul takes a slow drag, his lips almost a pout around the slim cylinder, before handing it back.

That's something like a kiss, Jim thinks.

 

 

 

 

 

That night Jim calls Marlon Brando just to hear his voice, staying silent on the line as Brando mumbles a few gruff questioning hellos before grumbling, "Kid, get help," and hanging up.

James considers Monty Clift next but ends up calling Paul Newman instead.

"Hello?" Paul says, pleasant even though it's nearing one a.m., the kind of voice Jim could hear answering the phone in an East Coast home. _Hello, Newman residence?_ "Talk fast, buddy, I'm half asleep."

"Awake enough for a drink?" Jim says. There's a brief minute where he wonders if Paul will know his voice, and –

Paul laughs. "Alright. Get your ass over here but you're out before the sun's up. I don't need more _actors_ sleeping on my couch. It's already too crowded with me there."

Paul is in a small mostly unfurnished apartment not unlike Jim's own, though Paul's is meant to be temporary until he either finds someplace for his wife or heads back to New York. Jim doesn't think in terms of temporary or permanent; he lives where he lives now and probably someday he'll live somewhere else.

Paul pours them decent enough whiskey and James plays pretend bongos on every flat surface. He hooks his glasses in the front of his shirt so he doesn't have to see Paul's eyes too well.

"Would've been swell to work together," Jim says, tipping his glass back for the last swallow, head tipping back with it.

"Suppose we don't look much like brothers," Paul says. He grins, but to James it's just a blur of white. "I'm much better looking."

"Ha ha," James says dryly. "If you were better looking you would have been the _lead_."

Paul laughs again, and his laugh always sounds so very _pleased_. James thinks he must like being made fun of, so long as it's funny. "You got me there, Dean."

James finds out Paul's bedroom's got no bed in it, which likely explains his wife's absence, and so he ends up taking over the couch – forcibly taking it over, squeezing between Paul and the back cushions until Paul can't stop laughing, and falls over the side.

 

 

 

 

 

_Silver Chalice_ is on the same lot as _Eden_ so James wanders over whenever he's got a break, usually eating half a sandwich that Paul will end up finishing or looking for cigarettes to bum.

Today Paul is still in costume, white toga against suntanned skin. Jim says it looks like Paul's wearing a pile of blankets but really he thinks Paul looks more than alright, looks like he'd fit right in with those ancient types. "Though it don't hurt that you've got nice legs," James remarks. To Paul's credit, he doesn't bat an eyelash, pretty as it would be if he did.

Next to Paul is a slight, pretty girl with dark hair whom James recognizes, and who introduces herself with her real name before rolling her eyes a little and correcting herself. _Pier Angeli_ , with a faint pretty accent.

Her eyes are a little challenging in her otherwise passive face and James isn't sure how to flirt with her so instead he's just mean. "Paul's got a wife, you know," he tells her. "You're gonna have to keep your hands to yourself around him."

Paul rolls his eyes, says, "Jim, I doubt she'll have any trouble."

But Pier only tilts her head slightly, observing him, and says, "So will you." And that's all it takes: James decides he likes her, likes her a lot.

Later he has Pier in his dressing room. She's loud and speaks only Italian. The next time he sees her, her mother's over her shoulder, and Pier gives him a small private smile.

Paul shakes his head. "Couldn't leave it alone, could you?"

 

 

 

 

 

Sometimes Paul comes to find him and they wander around set, Paul picking up random items in the Trask home and looking at Jim with wide blue eyes, bemoaning comically, " _This could have all been mine_."

And it could have, easily. Paul was probably too good-looking for the lead, and therefore definitely too good-looking for Aron, but he charms everyone on set with his good boy smiles and easy jokes. It makes James shy and he ends up trailing behind Paul like a puppy in his own damn workspace.

"I think this is really something," Paul says, more seriously. " _Chalice_ , I don't think so. But this…" He surveys the made-up room around them and gives a little nod.

"Well if I've got the great Paul Newman's approval," James says, flicking cigarette ash at him.

Paul tilts his head with a smile and says patronizingly, "I know that's all you want."

James is a little annoyed by Paul's easy grace and moody from scene work earlier so instead of a joke he lets his eyes trail all the way up Paul's well-made body until he reaches those blue, blue eyes. "Not all," he says.

"Jimmy," Paul says, a warning.

"What?" James says. He looks up at Paul all innocent.

Paul just looks back at him, a serious sort of look, and he puts his hands on either arm of Jim's chair, leans down until he's close enough for Jim to see, even without glasses. "What was that you told Pier?" he says. "About keeping to oneself?"

"I don't know," Jim says, because he honestly can't remember right now while he's looking up into Paul's face. "But I bet it was a load of bullshit."

Paul's intent expression cracks and an unwilling smile takes its place, which Jim thinks is an opening if ever there was one.

He tilts up until his mouth meets Paul's, a half-assed kind of kiss that could very well end with Jim taking a punch. He slumps back in his seat, looking up, waiting.

"Always got that look on your face," Paul says. "Like a puppy waiting for a kick."

James' head falls back against the chair and he wets his lips. Paul doesn't move at all, back or forward. "What's that mean, Paulie?"

Paul shakes his head a little and lifts one hand to smooth it over Jim's hair; it comes to rest just at the base of his neck. "I don't know," Paul says quietly. "Just a load of bullshit." Then he kisses James, firm and sweet.

The kisses are easily traded between them, neither furious nor languid, just Paul giving James a kiss and James giving it back. Something sparks at Jim's fingers and he flinches, realizes the cigarette had burned down to the quick. Paul smiles, but it barely reaches those blue eyes. He takes the cigarette tucked behind his ear and holds it to Jim's mouth, waits for Jim's lips to close around it before he flicks his lighter on, holds the flame to the cigarette's tip. Jim inhales, eyes on Paul's, and then Paul's fingers are there to take the cig back, James exhaling as Paul takes a draw.

Something like a kiss, Jim thinks again, but he'd rather give Paul a real one. When he does, it tastes of ash and nicotine. James keeps his eyes open, and all he sees is blue.  



End file.
